in the Campo de Gibraltar there is a general feeling that the trees have prevented the forest from being seen. During the last few years, in which drug trafficking has achieved its most alarming levels of impunity, this Cadiz region has been the scene of caches in broad daylight, chases with deceased agents or even an assault by hooded men on a hospital to release a detained drug trafficker. However, behind these thriller episodes lie eight Andalusian municipalities plagued by unemployment – around 30% in the general population and over 70% in young people from the most marginal neighborhoods –, due to school absenteeism – it is seven points higher than in the rest of the province– and due to a short life expectancy – La Línea de la Concepción is the only Spanish population that does not reach 80 years on average–.
When the Minister of the Interior, Fernando Grande-Marlaska, took office, one of the first objectives he set for himself was to re-establish the principle of authority in the Campo de Gibraltar. Mayors of the region agree that the special plan, which has been extended for the third time, is working. The data – which also includes phases in neighboring territories – speak for themselves: 10,840 suspects have been arrested or investigated in 9,700 police operations, which have allowed the seizure of more than 1,400 tons of drugs. But, as Francisco Mena, president of the Federation of Associations against Drug Trafficking in Cádiz, affirms, “the situation is not solved just by sending police officers.”
Mena, who has been fighting the drug scourge for more than twenty years, assures La Vanguardia that institutional abandonment and neglect do not respond to a specific political color. “The problem is not that one government or another abandoned us: it is that the State did it.” He points to the lack of opportunity as "the perfect breeding ground" for drug trafficking. “It is not that here in the south of Cádiz there is a gene prone to crime. It is the postal code of the area that marks the few possibilities of being able to choose”, explains Mena, who drew up – together with more than a dozen associations and unions – a comprehensive plan for the Campo de Gibraltar detailing the problems that weigh down the area and possible solutions to reverse them.
The economic engine of the area is the port of Algeciras, which leads freight traffic in Spain and has been recognized as the most efficient in Europe. However, their connection is third world. The railway connection between Algeciras and Bobadilla (Málaga) is a vital investment for the development of the industrial fabric of Campo de Gibraltar and the generation of employment. It is budgeted, but not executed.
Mayor José Ignacio Landaluce (PP), who attends La Vanguardia after accompanying candidate Juan Manuel Moreno throughout the morning campaigning for elections, points to investment in infrastructure as a "great need" and looks directly at Moncloa. Although he acknowledges that means have been allocated for security, this has not happened, he assures, in other fundamental ones such as education, training and employment. Landaluce calls for more involvement of the supra-municipal administrations to make the area competitive and fight against "the Spanish worker placement factory" that Gibraltar represents.
The mayor of La Línea de la Concepción agrees with this, José Juan Franco (100x100 La Línea), who in the last municipal elections became one of the three councilors with the most votes in Spain, winning 21 of the 25 councillors. In his town, more than 10,000 people work at La Roca, as the Rock is known. A daily labor emigration from a municipality whose unemployment exceeds 34%. Franco says he has the formula: a differentiated legal regime in the territorial structure of the nation in the form of an autonomous city – like Ceuta and Melilla – with its own tax regime for certain types of companies and workers.
In the conversation with the socialist Juan Carlos Ruiz, mayor of San Roque, the word that is repeated the most is formation. For those young people, he says, who heard "illegal siren songs of drug trafficking," but who deserve another chance now. And this happens, in his opinion, through professional training in industrial sectors in the area, so that later they do not have to leave the Campo de Gibraltar. A root that is also requested to be created – through the Special Singularity Zone mechanism – for police officers, judges and prosecutors. And don't run away at the first opportunity.
